Category Archives: Faith

8 reasons why my wife and I go to church.

Faith, Life, The Church,

Notre Dame December 2014

A few weeks ago my wife and I were having lunch with friends. During part of the conversation we began to discuss church. Our friends said they were no longer attending their church. One of the main reasons they gave was that the pastor’s sermons all sounded the same. During our ride home my wife and I were processing the conversation. The comment about our friends leaving their church because the pastor’s sermons sounded the same had really bothered us so we started to make a list of all of the reasons we attend the local church we do. Interestingly, none of the reasons we came up with had anything to do with the pastor’s sermons. Here is the list:

1. Its fun. We get to hang out with friends, go camping with teenagers, play  games with children,  have interesting conversations, drink good coffee, eat doughnuts, go on scavenger hunts, hike state parks, and in general have a great time.

2. We are working with a group of like-minded people on a mission to help heal the world. We help the homeless, encourage discouraged teenagers to see themselves as bright and shining children of God, support ministries to local families to help them overcome the  struggles of life, serve meals to friends and strangers, rake leaves for people who can’t do it for themselves, and try to come up with other ways to have a healing impact in our town.

3. We are participating in a movement much bigger than ourselves.  With that group of like minded people mentioned in number 2  we see ourselves as part of the the work God is doing to rescue this world from the kingdom of darkness. We are doing this by investing in the lives of children and teenagers so they can hear who they are in Christ, giving the homeless a safe place to stay and hear how much God loves them and wants to change their lives, by praying for one another, and by tangibly supporting each other through the difficulties and challenges in this life.

4. We get to be difference makers. We have had the opportunity to be alongside  teenagers and adults while they pray through emotional wounds from their past and see God speak directly into their hearts and heal them from the painful memories.

5. We get to be part of the solution. Its easy to point out the problems. We hang out with a  group of people who have decided to participate in the solution.

6. We go to church  to be around people who genuinely care about us  and how our family is doing. We get to hang out with people who we  can share our burdens with and who have our back.

7. We go to church because we  get to hang out with people we care deeply about.

8. We get to partner with Jesus and the work he is doing to bring his kingdom to the town we live in and around the world.

[And by the way, our pastor is a great preacher. His sermons have helped us grow tremendously in  our faith. That’s an added bonus.]

Am I a leader who tries to make everything okay or who deals with what is not okay?

Faith, Topics in Leadership, Work

Slieve League Cliffs Ireland

I realized the past couple of weeks that as a leader my natural inclination has been to help  the people I work with be okay or feel okay. I am waking  up to the fact that in doing so I often avoid  dealing with what is not okay. Dealing with what is not okay is hard. It takes intentionality, focus, and ongoing follow through. It takes being diligent at facilitating conversations between people who are angry with each other but who must work collaboratively together. It takes dealing with gossip immediately. It takes dealing with problems instead of passively accepting them.

Bring a leader who  deals with what is not okay  as opposed to trying to make everyone feel okay means I am committing myself to leaning into the deepest parts my organization. It means acknowledging the source of  problems, working through issues, executing viable solutions, and being diligent at ongoing maintenance of corrective actions.

I am praying that God will give me the wisdom, strength, courage, and persistence to be faithful in this pursuit.

This week with a smile.

Faith, Life

coffee_20101231_bg_0204

Three experiences and realizations this week:

1) I have been amazed at how my Heavenly Father provides. He does things conventional wisdom says wouldn’t happen. He does what he wants, when he wants, and no one can stop him.  Rest and wait.

2) Sometimes buying a dozen doughnuts to share with coworkers is called for.

3) I hoard coffee because I am afraid to run out.

Powerful life lessons about how to change the world from the commander of the U.S. Special Operations Command

Faith, Life, Topics in Leadership
Photo by Frank Wouters
Photo by Frank Wouters

Remarkable and inspiring advice on how to change the world. From the difference always making your bed  can have on your day to singing when you’re up to your neck in mud, Admiral McRaven gives examples of how  a person’s approach to life’s daily challenges  can change the world.

Remarks by Naval Adm. William H. McRaven, BJ ’77, ninth commander of U.S.Special Operations Command, Texas Exes Life Member, and Distinguished Alumnus. University-Wide Commencement The University of Texas at Austin, May 17, 2014.

Why “The Threshing Sledge”?

Faith, Life, Topics in Leadership, Work

Welcome to my blog. My name is Jerry Strausbaugh. What you will read here are the thoughts, experiences, ponderings, musings and questions I encounter while being a leader. Whether it is in my role as a husband, father, community mental health center director, seminary professor, service club member, or serving in church, I find that being a leader changes me.  I am so interested in how leadership changes the leader that I completed a doctoral dissertation on developmental process of community mental health center directors (Link: http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ashland1385055739).

The name of this blog is The Threshing Sledge. The reason for that being the name of this blog is found in my story of becoming a leader.  Early in my role as the executive director of a community mental health center I was so overwhelmed with the pressures and stresses of the job that I wanted to quit. I felt completely inadequate to accomplish the task. During this difficult time I cried out to God. Rather than opening an escape hatch God reshaped my identity. He used several Scriptures to speak to me about leading and how to think about the role he had placed me in. I began to see through the stories of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Nehemiah how leadership shapes both the leader and the led. One passage that spoke to me at a very critical time in my development is found in Isaiah 41:15-16,

See, I will make you into a threshing sledge, new and sharp, with many teeth. You will thresh the mountains and crush them, and reduce the hills to chaff. You will winnow them, the wind will pick them up, and a gale will blow them away. But you will rejoice in the Lord and glory in the Holy One of Israel.

I found these words to be aligned with my role as a leader. As the executive director I am frequently called upon to make difficult decisions in order to protect the mission of the organization. In a sense I act as the threshing sledge described in Isaiah.  Over the years since that insight I have grown more accustomed to the stresses of leading. Still, there are times I must go back to the defining words I received from the Old Testament prophet.  That is because leadership is a journey not a destination. Thank you for reading.